#(and greg davies' head)

[eesttm]

- And just for the record, the tasks aren't set just in the hopes of seeing me suffer? - Of course not, silly.

Taskmasterclass E01

[expelliarmus]

[shrack]

in series 1 greg is so possessive over alex being his assistant whenever a contestant uses him, while on his end alex is making it very clear that he finds greg absolutely perfect and amazing. which could mean nothing

[taskmasteristics]

thinking abt "it's a nightmare. he's a nightmare. but he's my nightmare." from greg's foreword in the 'bring me the head of the taskmaster' book

[grandfloridbigtallman]

ilove this promo image.awesome

[goddesspharo]

We have known each other many years, but this is the first time you've come to me for counsel or for help. Let's be frank here. You never wanted my friendship and you feared to be in my debt. Let's be reasonable here, Natasha. I mean, that's your big thing, isn't it? Reason backed up by murder. [Top Gun: Maverick mob!AU]

[3dprintcess]

From the official Twitter (https://twitter.com/taskmaster/status/1655548099618824194?s=20) Greg winds Ivo up during a prize task, and then they all take it further than anyone expected.

[kitschkicks]

The relationship of an iconic duo

I’ve been thinking of long running partnerships in performers, especially comedy, and what makes the dynamic so fascinating to me. 

Let’s focus for now on duos, though this definitely also works in threes and more. As an audience perhaps our attention is grabbed by the pair playing up a relationship dynamic for laughs or audiences, making innuendos or playing characters with an ‘old married couple’ dynamic. 

I imagine when they first start out together there is a predictable nervousness and excitement. Having to get close to someone, discover their quirks, pushing normal boundaries for the sake of the performance perhaps in intimate ways: it’s the stuff fake dating fics are made of. Getting physically closer and perhaps flirtier as characters as you also become closer as friends and performers, able to end each other's sentences and work seamlessly together. The thrill of someone who compliments you artistically. 

Do you try to escape it or lean into it? If you lean into it you run the risk of tying yourself to another person in the public eye, almost typecasting yourself. There is a vulnerability in that but also the exhilaration of seeing how well you work together, how you soar to new heights. 

And then it really gets interesting when a duo work together for so long that it’s routine. For years you work together. You are a duo now, names spoken in the same breath, personal identity almost subsumed by the partnership. The performers existential horror of ceasing to exist as an individual entity. You might as well be a two headed creature, defined by the other. They are your other half. 

And it’s good. It feels natural, comfortable. There’s no nervousness or tension in it any more, no worries of overstepping, you know their boundaries perfectly, or have discovered that between the two of you, they barely exist. Being comfortable with each other in a way that many people have never experienced. All the tension is external now, the reactions of others. Comments that you are sleeping together flow off your back. You’ve heard it so often for so long, it’s almost proof it’s working, that you work as a partnership. Don’t they understand that what you have is deeper than that actually? Somehow more intimate and intertwined than just 2 people who are fucking? 

Especially with comedy. You have the jokes for the audience and your own inside jokes. You are full of glib answers you give at interviews or to comments, blurring the lines between character and performer somewhat. Add to that the strange power dynamics written into what you do. The scripted ones you perform between yourselves. The improv games where you challenge each other to take it further. The way you are both dominant over the audience and participants, but utterly beholden to them too. As you play your public facing roles for so long, does that character start to become more like you? Do you start to become more like your character? You certainly become more like your partner. 

There is a bone deep trust between you, with the act, with your career, your feelings, your body- maybe even your life. 

What do you do with that if it goes on for long enough? Do you actually start a love affair? Get married? No, that’s not what you have, the dynamic is totally different, and yet in a way, anyone marrying you from then on has to accept you have another older deeper partnership. It’s almost a form of polygamy. Certainly polyamory. After all, you love your partner, not the frivolous horny love people joke about but the deep bond of friendship, soulmates really. If they were to die, a piece of you would be lost. The act would be over, not just amended but entirely done. There is no replacement. 

As beautiful and terrifying and inevitable as falling in love.

When was it, the point of no return? Was it when you got your first award together? Your first good review? Perhaps it was after your first run of shows, or the first time you shared an audience. Was it the day you met? Was it that inevitable? 

Or perhaps you’re thinking about it the wrong way? 

Was it the first time someone asked you about the other’s feelings, expecting you to know automatically, and you did, answering without thinking. When you first invited them for a trip or special occasion, them slotting into your private life as naturally as they did your public life? When they had a health scare and as you heard the news for a moment you felt your heart freeze in your chest. You know for a fact, no matter what fans my gossip, that it wasn’t the first time you kissed (stilted and staged and done with ears almost entirely on the audience except for a small part of you wondering about what would be said backstage) but perhaps it was the first time you kissed with no one watching? Just a peck really, just an outburst of affection, not caring what anyone else thought about it at all. It wasn’t romantic or lavasious or exaggerated the way your jokes are, just pure and human, no thought or agenda there at all. 

So yeah… that’s what it is that really gets me about performer partnerships. And this is all in my head, maybe it’s not like that at all, but just trying to think what it could be like sends my thoughts into the clouds for hours. 

[iamnotoriginalphil]

I have a theory that if you find Anthony Head hot in btvs then you’ll find Greg Davis hot

[gubbins-turtledove]

Listen. Taskmonster.

[eesttm]

looking at each other during the live task

S18E01

[reallifepotato]

i know it's old but i don't think we talk about this enough

[4th-make-quail]

I wish I could win head from Greg Davies

[taskmasteristics]

i am so normal abt this pocket watch btw

[mymultifandomhell]

no but i literally feel so validated because i’ve been singing it’s me fern brady in my head on repeat since that episode

[everyshadeofwrong]

he has a point tho